Ego Prevents You From Learning

Hey Team. All right, so here we are. Can you believe it’s November? Wow! What happens in November? Well, I don’t know about you, but for the Withrow family, it’s pretty packed.

Let’s start with what November is for us. November for the Withrow family involves the Marine Corps birthday and Jonathan’s birthday. Jonathan and I spend a great time around Veterans Day because there’s lots of free food all around for veterans. At the same time, many of these places also offer birthday dinners, breakfasts, or whatever. Jonathan, our family, and I spend a little bit of time going out to eat at some of our favorite restaurants and getting a couple of free meals to boot. It’s awesome!

The next big thing that happens in November is Karen and my 31st anniversary. Can you guys believe Karen has been stuck with me for 31 years? She must be a little bit crazy. What a blessing it is to have my beautiful bride for 31 years. Celebrating this year is going to be awesome! We also have Thanksgiving, which is also wonderful thing, to be thankful for family and other things. November is a pretty packed month for the Withrows, but so is Northwest Enforcement.

We have lots of things planned in November. The executive team spends a lot of time budgeting for the new year, looking at the past year, and so on. By the time we’re done with November and moving into December—which is also a very packed month—the Withrows get pretty tired, and January comes around, and we are ready for some relaxation. I don’t know about you, but with the new year beginning, I am excited about November. I hope you are too!

But I’m really here to talk to you for a few minutes about something I read. I’m going to unpack this over the next few weeks. Each week, we’re going to talk about one of these ideas, and the first one that I read was: Ego prevents you from learning from others.

Again, ego prevents you from learning from others.

Our ego can prevent us from learning from others. Our ego can get us into trouble. If you come into my office and sit around our conference table, you’ll see on one of the shelves on the wall, in our little cubicle room, a sign that says: Ego kills talent.

It doesn’t matter how talented you are—if you have an ego, your ego can kill your talent. It can destroy you, and it will prevent you from learning from others. You might think you know it all, but your ego will prevent you from growing and learning from other people. It’ll also make people want to steer away from you. They might see your talents and abilities, but the closer they get to you and realize what kind of ego you have, they tend to steer away. No matter how talented you are, they want to get away from you because they don’t want to hang around someone who is egotistical and focused only on themselves.

That’s an important thing for us to recognize and remember—our ego can kill our talent. So on this beautiful day, as you’re thinking and reflecting on where you sit, ask yourself: Is your ego killing your talent? Are people not wanting to be around you because of your ego?

It’s something to unpack in your own life, to dwell on and think about. Most of us know somebody that we steer away from because of their ego. That can be a driving force that prevents us from growing, excelling, and prospering in what we are meant to do and be. It’s something for you to think about as you move through the rest of this month of November.

God bless you. Have a wonderful week, and remember—let’s be valuable, because nothing less will do. All right, I’ll talk to you guys next week!